Using Skywatcher go to AZ on a wedge

[Rod Lutterworth]

Hi there, my first post so please be gentle!!

I have a skywatcher synscan goto AZ mount and have been trying to find out if it is possible to use this on a wedge  and effectively convert it into an EQ system for better imaging and to eliminate the problem of field rotation in long exposures.

Up to now I didn't find anything positive on this but have been giving it some thought and want to ask for comments on my idea.

I was thinking that if you set up the observing site in the controller handset to be at 90'N then all visible objects are circumpolar and therefore when tracking at siderial rate only the azimuth axis will rotate. If the mount is then fitted to a correctly set up and aligned wedge it should track as an EQ system.

Obviously the goto function will not work but you should still be able to use the alt and az axes to point to objects.

I suspect I may be missing something obvious, and perhaps someone else has already thought about or tried this. If it is not going to work it would be nice to know and would save me going to the trouble of constructing a wedge.

Thanks in advance for comments/suggestions.

Rod

Edited February 23, 2017 by Rod Lutterworth

[happy-kat]

Welcome.

You might want to read the no eq challenge thread because there are members using altaz mounts to image with. Exposure lengths vary from 30-60s and stacking many frames can bring out detail. What camera and telescope or lens are you using?

[RT65CB-SWL]

Hi Ron and welcome to SGL.

Question... What 'scope are you mounting on it?

I will be honest, I am not au-faix with this mount. Is it this one https://www.firstlightoptics.com/az-goto/skywatcher-az-goto-mount.html? - I think the bottom bowl houses some 'gubbins' ...ie battery compartment. If it is ABS plastic then I would think it would need some reinforcing inside, (penny/mudguard washers), and drilling some holes for the bolts or screws to the wedge to pass through for added strength, assuming it has the room for them and it does not short circuit anything electronic or electrical, and you are OK with a bit of DIY. If it is 'new' then you will invalidate the guarrantee/warranty period. Personally I would lower one or two rear legs somewhere to achieve your polar alignment and add a weight to the north leg or legs to help balance it when laden withh your 'scope and accessories.

Don't despair just yet. I am sure other SGL'ers will offer advice on what is best for you and your equipment.

Edited February 23, 2017 by Philip R

[jambouk]

Even if you could make a wedge, the handset will still think it is an alt ax mount and I'd have throught will try and track things using both the altitude and azimuth axes and in doing so continue to give you field rotation AND not actually track your target. So I can't see how this would work using the handset. You'd have to some how take over the mount with other driving software.

I'll be interested to hear what others say.

James

[ronin]

There used to be an option in the menu for saying you had equitorially mounted the thing. Then they had the firmware determine the mount and as the mount is always Alt/Az the option went. However this stopped people doing what you are asking for.

I thought that they had added the option back in but from the Synscan Manual I have there is no such option available. Equally the manual is handset only not scope and the menu tree given seems a little short on expected options.

Exactly which scope have you as that way the manual for that specific scope can be located and read.

There a memory that says maybe it was the Celestron SE range that this occurred on and was reinstated, so maybe the Skywatchers remained "fixed" to the mount type with no manual redefinition.

Edited February 23, 2017 by ronin

[happy-kat]

I've seen that option described in the early Virtuoso manual about setting the mount to EQ and put in on a wedge but that mount has a buiilt in button control pad.

[Rod Lutterworth]

Hi guys. Thank you all for your comments. Here is a bit more info on what I have and am trying to do:

I have now made a "static test" whereby I set my location to 90'N and then monitored the position of the axes as the drive tracked at sidereal rate. The AZ axis tracked at the required 0.25'/min and there was no movement of the alt axis. This was seen regardless of the alt axis position.

The mount came along with the skymax 127 Maksutov. I got them second hand but it is the same as this one:

https://www.harrisontelescopes.co.uk/acatalog/SkyWatcher-Skymax-127-SynScan-AZ-GOTO-Telescope.html?gclid=CKPx942pqdICFUq17QodKBEEng

I really want to use the mount for wide field imaging with s DSLR. I recently made a "barn door" mount but driving it by hand is a hassle and so I was wondering if the synscan could be used in EQ mode to reduce field rotation. It may be that for the lenses I am using and the relatively short exposure times that field rotation won't be an issue, but now I have a "bee in my bonnet" about this and it has become a bit of a  "mission" for me just to see what may be possible with the equipment I have.

I am grateful to Philip R for his suggestion to try and adjust the legs of the tripod to set the "wedge" angle and may give that a go before starting to build a conventional wedge from scratch. You are also right that the "bowl" is full of "grubbins" which will make the secure mounting of the drive to a wedge more challenging.

All I need  needed now is some decent weather !!! Having said that it's actually a good time to be making things in anticipation of better sky's to come along eventually.

Rod

 

 

 

[happy-kat]

Have a look at these linkls. Camera lens image 135mm AltAz tracking mount. I got a red dot finder with camera flash hot shoe fitment from astroboot and this works fine for aligning my altaz tracking mount. Just showing you could get going now with what you have and something to fall back on if you can't get the EQ wedge idea to work.

sample 1

sample 2

sample 3

sample 4

Edited February 24, 2017 by happy-kat
added two further samples

[Louis D]

What if you set your latitude to 90 degrees North?  That way, it would track using only the azimuth axis while wedge mounted.  You couldn't use it to locate objects, but it should track once pointed properly.  Does this mount even have an option to set latitude or does it strictly depend on star alignment to track?

[ronin]

Thanks for the model, located the manual and there is no Eq mode of operation specified in it. Also looking at the mount it would appear that placing it on an Eq wedge would be difficult.

Seems that it is dedicated to being Alt/Az only in operation. Any work round will therefore be exactly that and may not be overly accurate.

From reading through the 6SE it, and I presume the others, have an EQ South and an EQ North option, so they can be set to operate on a wedge, actually the manual shows them on a wedge as well. Somewhat annoyingly the SE mount unit looks somewhat similar to the 127 AZ unit, just guess they did not put the Eq option in the firmware.

That sort of ties in with the memory of the Eq going from one (Nexstar SE scopes) then being put back. But it occurred some years back.

[Mo P]

On 23/02/2017 at 16:27, happy-kat said:

Welcome.

You might want to read the no eq challenge thread because there are members using altaz mounts to image with. Exposure lengths vary from 30-60s and stacking many frames can bring out detail. What camera and telescope or lens are you using?

 

[Mo P]

Hi

forgive me as I am very new to this hobby. 
I have a Skywatcher Virtuoso mount with SynScan handset. 
I have made a wedge out of 10mm acrylic sheet. 
My question is with mount in equatorial mode (press button 5 and power up) and mounted on the wedge, will the handset still have the goto function? as I want to try deep sky photography. 
If it doesn’t it will be difficult to locate objects. 
I also use Stellarium which I guess will not be able to point scope at a selected objects. 
I don’t know if I am trying to run before I can walk. 
Any help would be very much appreciated. 
Thanks in advance 

[happy-kat]

I have a virtuoso mount but so far have been using it in Alt Az and have done some imaging with it within the limitations of it's tracking before star trails become too apparent.

My mount has a later firmware and so far proves not to have the EQ mode button 5 recognition as seen in the earlier copies of the user manual, though I intend at some point to make a test wedge to double check.

I have seen your other thread.

 

[Mo P]

On 04/07/2020 at 14:59, Mo P said:

 

I am using Skywatcher Heritage 114 Virtuoso with Nikon D5100 with standard lens or 200mm  telephoto or no lens with camera fitted to scope with adapter and 2x Barlow. 

[Mo P]

Hi 

my button 5 option works fine on my V5 handset 

[Mo P]

[Mo P]

On 04/07/2020 at 21:05, happy-kat said:

I have a virtuoso mount but so far have been using it in Alt Az and have done some imaging with it within the limitations of it's tracking before star trails become too apparent.

My mount has a later firmware and so far proves not to have the EQ mode button 5 recognition as seen in the earlier copies of the user manual, though I intend at some point to make a test wedge to double check.

I have seen your other thread.

 

Forgive me if my posts are all over the place I am new to this App. 

[happy-kat]

That is a super wedge you have made there.

As you have built a wedge we can skip you could get started in astrophotography using it in alt az mode. Though if you do use it in alt az mode I found with mine I needed to make the weight of the camera/lens slightly bias to being tail heavy when imaging East and slightly nose heavy when imaging to the West. Perfect balance does not work always and I found a slight star trailing bias on the altitude direction, your mileage may vary.

Hi, I am confused, are you connecting the handset and then turning it on whilst you hold button 5 on the v5 handset, I did not think that would work, anyway your mount one way or another is supporting EQ mode from your comment.

The synscan handset will not recognise the virtuoso as having EQ mode support so will offer only altaz (as far as I know). The synscan handset with the later firmwares read the mount and recognise whether they are altaz or eq, so the handset ill only recognise the virtuoso as altaz I think.

When you want to use the wedge I think you wont get EQ goto options.

You could fit a sight tube to your wedge to align the wedge to polaris (I think given the mount the detail of lining up to the NCP is overkill). Then place the mount on the wedge with the mount's north arrow lined up to facing up to polaris.

 

These are threads on the virtuoso mount you may find interesting.

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/189541-pc-control-of-sky-watcher-virtuoso-mount/

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/239925-skywatcher-heritage-virtuoso-controlled-via-bluetooth/

link to a capture and reprocess of Orion using the cirtuoso in altaz mode nd a vintage Nikon Q200mm lens on a canon 1100d.

[Mo P]

9 minutes ago, Mo P said:

Forgive me if my posts are all over the place I am new to this App. 

 

1 hour ago, happy-kat said:

That is a super wedge you have made there.

As you have built a wedge we can skip you could get started in astrophotography using it in alt az mode. Though if you do use it in alt az mode I found with mine I needed to make the weight of the camera/lens slightly bias to being tail heavy when imaging East and slightly nose heavy when imaging to the West. Perfect balance does not work always and I found a slight star trailing bias on the altitude direction, your mileage may vary.

Hi, I am confused, are you connecting the handset and then turning it on whilst you hold button 5 on the v5 handset, I did not think that would work, anyway your mount one way or another is supporting EQ mode from your comment.

The synscan handset will not recognise the virtuoso as having EQ mode support so will offer only altaz (as far as I know). The synscan handset with the later firmwares read the mount and recognise whether they are altaz or eq, so the handset ill only recognise the virtuoso as altaz I think.

When you want to use the wedge I think you wont get EQ goto options.

You could fit a sight tube to your wedge to align the wedge to polaris (I think given the mount the detail of lining up to the NCP is overkill). Then place the mount on the wedge with the mount's north arrow lined up to facing up to polaris.

 

These are threads on the virtuoso mount you may find interesting.

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/189541-pc-control-of-sky-watcher-virtuoso-mount/

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/239925-skywatcher-heritage-virtuoso-controlled-via-bluetooth/

link to a capture and reprocess of Orion using the cirtuoso in altaz mode nd a vintage Nikon Q200mm lens on a canon 1100d.

Thanks for your reply 

I find all this very confusing as I only started in April/May. 
I press 5 on mount and it starts in EQ mode, only tracks in az. 
I have tried with handset not connected and with it connected. I would have thought all being Skywatcher they would all work together and have more info from Skywatcher.  
The user guide I have for mount says mount on wedge type tripod and start mount using 5 so surely it should work. 

Why oh why can’t Skywatcher be more helpful??

cheers Maurice 

[happy-kat]

The mount works great with the handset in altaz mode. 

As far as I understand when on a wedge and button 5 on the virtuoso keypad had been pressed on start up, the mount would effectively track using the azimuth motor.

I haven't built the wedge here yet to offer practical help and my drive to building a wedge has been low as I have been imaging with it in altaz (and my virtuodo probably doesn't support it), I know this presents limitations but not enough to force making a wedge (plus I did build a manual barn door tracking device which works eq)

Just while starting out why not use your camera with a wild field lens like a 55mm or so and practice with that. The idea with DSO is you take lots of images and stack them (there is software for this) through image processing of a whole new area.

I have a red dot finder mounted in my camera flash hot shoe, this helps with aiming on the sky. I mount the camera on either a dove bar or a skywatcher L bracket which I think came with the virtuoso.

@Geoff Lister do you have any ideas for those new member

[Geoff Lister]

On 07/07/2020 at 14:53, happy-kat said:

@Geoff Lister do you have any ideas for those new member

I too have failed to get my Virtuoso mount to go into EQ mode, using the "5" button power-up. However, I made a crude wooden wedge for my 51.4 degree latitude and changed the mount's location latitude to 90 degrees (pretending to be at the North Pole). This gave me tracking movement in the azimuth axis only, so effectively an EQ mount.

The mount works well in Az/Alt mode with the Az/Alt V3 Synscan handset "borrowed" from my Skyliner 250PX.

Geoff